I usually don't like to bring political issues to my web site, but since the RANTS section of my site was built for me to air my opinions I might as well make use of it. Like many other Americans I have spent much of my free time glued to CNN to find out what's going on in the war with Iraq. Let me say this. I HATE WAR. All war. People die in wars. While I do not believe the war was necessary at this point in time, I do believe that it would eventually have to happen. Perhaps the world support for it may have increased as time went on. In any case, it is upon us now. I would like to note that while I am unsure about the timing of this war, I absolutely support the coalition troops and the tough job that they have been asked to do. As I watch the various happenings in the news, certain things come to mind. I have decided to create this page to show them to you. They are short thoughts and are not displayed in any particular order.  It will be updated every few days at a minimum.

    People against this war argue that many innocent Iraqi civilians will be killed by coalition forces. I say this to those people. YES Iraqi civilians will die in this war. That is for certain. Like ALL wars, there are civilian casualties. It is one of the harsh realities of war and is unavoidable. But how many innocent Iraqi's would be murdered by Saddam's regime if he were allow to continue to be in power? It's a known fact that he has people killed frequently who are completely innocent. Sometimes, he and/or his regime do it just from fun. So it could be said, how many lives will we be saving by removing him?

    Some reports have been coming from Arab sources stating that coalition forces have been specifically targeting civilians. As absurd as that is, what's worse is that some people actually believe it. Give me a break!! Are they really that stupid? The fact is that we are losing lives by trying to be as careful as possible not to harm civilians. This is an expensive but worthy cause. It would be nice if the rest of the world would see that.

    As the Iraqi regime takes prisoners, they prove to the world that they do not believe in the conventions of war. The first pictures and video released by Iraq showed prisoners being mistreated. Pictures of dead coalition troops were shown and some had been shot in the forehead. That means they were executed. One of my other personalities is telling me that we should treat some of our Iraqi POWs the same way and show it to them. But then my more sane personality reminds me that it would do no good for two reasons. 1) We are better than that. We would not and should not stoop to the level of the Iraqi regime. 2) The Iraqi government could care less about what happens to their people.

    Blood for Oil? This seems to be a common theme amongst protestors. These people think that are reason for this war is only for oil. Okay, I will concede that oil probably has its value in this war. However, these folks (being one sided as they are) completely forget some of the other reasons for war. How about the fact that Saddam likes to rule by terror and commonly tortures and kills his own people. (This is a known fact). How about the fact that in the Gulf war, he invaded Kuwait and was killing EVERYONE he could find there. When we ran him out of Kuwait, we stopped just short of Bagdad. He gave up because he knew his ass was grass. When he gave up, he agreed to many things in order to keep control of Iraq and save his sorry ass from a sure death. However, he never kept his word on most of the things he promised to the world. The world will be a much safer place without him.